Once a drag racer, then a timing technician and now a track manager – Bubba Corzine has seen it all.

 

When Bubba Corzine needed a diversion from the demands of fielding and driving a racecar, timing was on his side. When Corzine walked away from driving Pro Stock, he journeyed into the complex world of timing drag races.

 

Corzine joined forces with Bob Brockmeyer, the founder of the Compulink timing system, where he worked for 11 years.

 

He’s since moved on to the world of serving as general manager of Kennedale Dragway in Texas and devotes a portion of his time to serving as competition director for the two-year old American Drag Racing League. Once again, it was all about timing.

 

Too much travel and an investment in two convenience stores led to Corzine’s decision to hang up the national tour in favor of working at a local track.

 

“I worked a bit on the weekends at Kennedale and the opportunity presented itself for me to get back into this and I took it,” Corzine said. “It’s a five-day work week. It’s a job and we work that place.”

 

What few remember is prior to becoming a timing system technician, Corzine ran a 500-inch Pro Stock engine prepared by Reher-Morrison, in 1983. That larger engine for its era gave way to an even larger displacement to compete in IHRA Pro Stock.

 

“I had one of the largest Chevrolet motors at the time that displaced 605 inches,” said Corzine. “They shipped it to me and I put it in at Roy Hill’s shop. I brought it out to Rockingham. The first pass out of the box ran a 7.61 at 181. That put me third in the field and it was really a lot of fun.

 

After spending time working with the timing system and as a track manager, Corzine admits there is a part of him that longs for simpler days.

 

“You could buy parts back then and just bolt them in,” said Corzine. “You could guess at the clutch and the rear-end and be competitive. It was out there and all you had to do was look for the horsepower.”

 

Prior to 1983, Corzine and partner Bobby Cross fielded one of the more competitive Competition eliminator Econo Dragsters of the era. Not only did Cross and Corzine win Indy in 1979, they also won a world championship.

 

“We actually ran two dragsters – a C/ED in 1978 and the next year we built a Don Ness car and it weighed 1,235 pounds with the driver. The car was light and ran A/ED with a small block in it. In 1979, we ran a 7.40 at 181 miles per hour.”

 

Corzine said he and Cross reached the finals of every NHRA event in 1979 except for two. Bob Newberry, a multi-time world champion who is rumored to have retired at the conclusion of this season, was their most heated rival.

 

“Bob and Bobby created an intense rivalry,” Corzine said. “They remain great friends today. But we had some great rivalries with others like Larry Torres and John Lingenfelter. It was fun.”

 

Despite the desire for simpler days, Corzine holds true to commitments. Once he stepped out from behind the wheel he was done with driving. Now he’s content being outside the car.

 

“Gosh no, I won’t drive any more because I’ve gotten too old,” Corzine said. “I might want to get back into the sport. I wouldn’t mind owning a car or something. I could put one of these young drivers in there.”

 

If he did get the hankering to return to driving, Corzine said Pro Modified would be his direction and he’d have Don Ness prepare a lightweight car for him.

 

“Pro Stock is just so cost prohibitive these days,” Corzine said. “You can get into Pro Modified for so much cheaper. With the Pro Modifieds, you could race about as many times as you wanted to. We have the Texas Outlaw Pro Modified Association out where I am.”

 

 

There’s a lot more to maintaining a timing system than just putting up cones and calling cars to the staging lanes - Bubba Corzine

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                        THE TIMING OF TODAY

 

Corzine said eighth-mile drag racing, while it has been run at two IHRA national events in 2007, is not a passing fad. The IHRA will open the season with one of those events.

 

“When you race the eighth-mile, you find it is much easier and cuts down on the oildowns,” Corzine said. “I think it’s the way to go and the future. Sooner or later, I think you’ll see 1,000-foot drag racing because of the speeds and elapsed times these cars are running. It wouldn’t surprise me at all.”

 

Corzine said he’s wondered when the major sanctioning bodies would eventually embrace eighth-mile racing as a viable alternative to the traditional quarter-mile.

 

“I think the time is coming when you are going to see some eighth-mile racing on both major sanctioning bodies because we are running out of facilities capable of staging national events,” Corzine said. “Sooner or later, if we are going to run 25 on the NHRA side and 13 on the IHRA side -- there is not going to be enough tracks to run these events. From attrition I think it is going to evolve down to that.

 

“We have an awful lot of good tracks that we can run eighth-mile on. There are a lot of tracks that you could shorten and they would provide perfect venues. Columbus, Ohio? That would be the perfect place to start.”

 

The timing technician that still remains a part of Corzine would love to see the shorter distance an accepted part of the sport on the national scale.

 

“It is easier to maintain and you don’t get as much stuff run over,” said Corzine. “I pretty much maintain my equipment at Kennedale because it is a Compulink system. I keep abreast of what happens with timing equipment.

 

“The timing stuff evolves all the time and you really have to stay in it to keep up. Bob has some great fiber-optic stuff. I’m not into the new stuff yet, but I enjoy the operation end of running a track.”

 

When the NHRA had severe timing problems during several events in 2006, Corzine said he knew exactly what the problem was.

 

“It was simply that they stopped bringing in Bob and his team,” Corzine said. “For some reason the NHRA stopped bringing them in and they weren’t capable of maintaining the system. I always came in two days early and spent that time lining things up – checking heights and rollouts. There’s a lot more to it than just putting up cones and calling cars to the staging lanes.”

 

Corzine, because he did so much pre-race preparation, made himself look like the laziest man around at times during the weekend.

 

“It turns into a pretty big joke because we were sitting around doing nothing during the race, but we’re not supposed to,” Corzine said. “You get ready for two or three days before the event and then you don’t have to do it. The NHRA found out the hard way.

 

“All of the timing systems are only as good as you set them up. The Compulink system is so user friendly in that it is one button. When you walk up to it, it looks complex but it is easy to use.”

 

Corzine said the current configuration of drag racing’s timing systems work great but added there’s always room for improvement.

 

“I think if I could improve one thing, it would be in the staging,” Corzine said. “Bob is currently working on a new system where we just have a wall of beams. You will be able to stage with the front end of the car. This will eventually do away with the three beams on the starting line. It will be a wall of infra-reds. If you roll in a certain distance, it turns on the pre-stage and then you can stage. If you roll even further it will turn on the red-light.”

 

 

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